Trust us: You don't want to go to a restaurant on Valentine's Day. Make one of these menus at home, instead.

Cooking at home is way more romantic than going out on Valentine's Day. For starters, you don't have to deal with mediocre food at extortive prices. Grab a bottle of wine and cozy up with one of these four menus. From the classics to something a bit more worldly, these dinner ideas run from starter to dessert and will set the mood...for whatever else happens on Valentine's Day. Probably doing the dishes.

A great Caesar salad recipe gets its swagger from a great Caesar dressing recipe. Squeamish about raw egg yolks and anchovies? Sorry. Yolks are what give richness to the emulsion, while anchovies provide a briny blast (and that whole umami thing). This is part of BA's Best, a collection of our essential recipes.

It’s not about the potatoes—it’s what you do to the potatoes. In this recipe, precook them until they’re tender, then dispatch clarified butter (which is less likely to burn), heat, and time to help them become their best selves.

At Pirelli's restaurant in Rome, chef Barbara Lynch ate what was, for her, the perfect carbonara: The sauce was bright yellow from fresh eggs, and each rigatoni hid cubes of fatty guanciale. In Boston, where Lynch has five restaurants, she set out to master the dish. Her yolk-heavy recipe is beyond creamy—without cream!—with a heady mix of peppercorns (you can substitute black pepper for all and it's still great). It's unlike any clumpy carbonaras you've had. The tricks? She omits most of the egg whites; their water thins the sauce. Too much cheese overthickens it, so she gradually adds Pecorino while tossing the pasta until she hits the right consistency (the sauce should be loose enough to drag the pasta through). Lynch was right: It's a pasta worth mastering. This is part of BA's Best, a collection of our essential recipes.